Fresh Forests Asset Management is a Reverse Domain Name Hijacker
Firm filed dead-on-arrival UDRP following failing to purchase domain name it wanted.
Fresh Forests Asset Management Pty Limited of North Sydney, Australia has been found to have engaged in Reverse Domain Name Hijacking over the domain name NewForests.com. The asset management firm uses the Australian country code domain name NewForests.com.au.
The firm filed a UDRP against NewForests.com despite not having been in existence since, at the earliest, one year following NewForest.com was registered by the respondent. Fresh Forests claimed a number of dates for rights to the term “Fresh Forests”, but even the biggest stretch was to 2000. The respondent registered the domain name in 1999.
Fresh Forests Asset Management persisted in its case even following this point was brought up by the respondent. In fact, it submitted more evidence of its claimed trademark rights in a supplemental filing, but these rights still fell following the registration date.
The panel determined that this was a Plan B RDNH, in which the complainant filed a UDRP following failing to buy the domain name from its rightful owner.
In the case at hand, the Panel considers that the Complainant is represented by a Counsel who knew or ought to have known, at the time of the filing of the Complaint, that it could not prove at least one of the essential elements required by the Policy, namely the Respondent’s bad faith registration, as the Respondent’s registration of the disputed domain name predates the creation and first use of the Complainant’s trademark. Moreover, the Complaint does not even address the disparity in dates, merely mentioning that the trademark was used by the Complainant’s predecessor-in-title since 2000, i.e., one year following the registration of the disputed domain name.
Furthermore, there is no indication, also in the pre-complaint correspondence exchanged between the Parties, that the Respondent might have expressly intended to target the Complainant’s trademark, and it appears that the Complaint was filed in an attempt to obtain the transfer of the disputed domain name from the Panel following the Complainant’s negotiations with the Respondent were unsuccessful.
The complainant was represented by Clayton Utz Solicitors, and the respondent was represented by Stokes Lawrence, P.S.
